


Crystalline Knowledge of You

by AetherAria



Category: The Penumbra Podcast
Genre: Blood mentioned, Character Study, Ficlet, How the hell do I tag this, Lizard Kissin' Tuesday (Penumbra Podcast), Multi, Second Citadel (Penumbra Podcast)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-30
Updated: 2019-10-30
Packaged: 2021-01-08 08:17:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,206
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21232682
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AetherAria/pseuds/AetherAria
Summary: There are things that Sir Damien the Pious is built for, as if they were written on his very bones.





	Crystalline Knowledge of You

**Author's Note:**

> Two for one special on fics this week!! how the hell did this happen. I'm a mess. This is a mess.
> 
> Title from the song Crystal, by Stevie Nicks.

There are things that Sir Damien the Pious is built for, as if they were written on his very bones. There are things, also, that he is not.

Sir Damien is built for storytelling. Even in his youth, even when his tongue would freeze and his breath would halt and he would be utterly unable to recite, his failed performances were never an indication of a lack of passion or understanding. On his own, away from the judgment and the eyes of his father, he would pour over the stories, caress the pages, tales jumping to vivid life behind his eyes, clashing steel and bravery and pure, tranquil love-

He is built for words. He is built for the flow of them, assonance like a silver river over round rocks, rhythm and rhyme that come to him as naturally as breath, as easily as day dips down into night. He collects, with the care of the most dutiful curator, language in every size, crystalline words that sing on their own, phrases that lilt like pre-dawn birds, vast and sweeping tales like an entire orchestra in concert, and he folds them into his mind and he turns them. He turns them, examines and rearranges and cultivates, and he loves each word and phrase and tale, loves their shape, loves the way they pull his heart. Loves also, the way they pull on the hearts of those with whom he shares them. Loves the way he may enchant, the way that every eye upon him will shine as he recites or composes, loves the thrill of challenge and the delight of victory when he can coerce even a simple sentence just so, until he can weave it into something that may bring an audience to tears or cheering delight.

Stories, words, meaning and theme and pleasure, and Damien revels in every jubilant syllable. More lucky he, that he should be so attuned to creating passion in others, to match that which exists naturally in himself.

  


Sir Damien is not built to fight. It is not a thing that comes to him _naturally_, or without pain. His prowess is built on layers, and years, and layers, practice and practice and practice until his fingers bleed. Practice until he wakes with his arms tight and clawed, miming the shape of his bow in the grip of dreams. Practice until his lungs burn with it, until he can bury that burn, until he can fire ten shots in a row while reciting verse, with his voice bright and clear, his breath even and steady. Practice until the fight _becomes_ his nature. Until his reactions are so quick and so clean that they could be mistaken for instinct. Until it can be mistaken for ease. Until the bow may as well have grown out of his own hands, an extension of his will.

In his youth, in training, an older squire (or perhaps only a bigger, stronger squire) laughs down at him, sneers and says he looks as suiting as a rabbit training for combat, and when not-yet-Sir Damien soundly knocks that squire into the mud in the duel that results from the insult, Damien thinks that even rabbits have teeth. He learns, with effort and strain, how a rabbit such as he may bite.

He is not built for this. These hands (still ink-stained, thin feather-cuts bled in with black like lines on a map) are not meant to draw blood. Damien remembers this, on occasion, when the shaft of his arrow is between his fingers, when he draws and no longer feels it burn his shoulders like slow acid. He is not built for violence, but in service of his Saint and his Queen his hands can do so much to stay violence done to others, now that he has practiced, and practiced, and _practiced_. He can be more than he was made to be. He _must_ be more. For his Saint, for his Citadel.

  


Sir Damien is built to love. He feels, at times, like a vessel filled with _only_ love. A tea kettle, perhaps- boiling and bubbling and overflowing, shrieking his desperate affection until someone can ease him another inch from the fire, until his passions can be steadied and brought to bear. He loves Saint Damien, his patron, his namesake, that soft steady current which guides him. He loves his Citadel, both sturdy and fragile. He loves his Queen, a model of diligence and decorum. He loves his fellow knights, in all their flawed brashness. He loves Sir Angelo, loves him and is loved back with equal ferocity (he and his rival match each other in many ways, despite their differences). He loves Rilla-

He sees her in dim candlelight, scowling at her notes, eyes dancing with challenge, and he needs pause to catch his racing breath. He feels her hands in his hair, gentle and soothing and playful, and his eyes well with helpless tears. She sings for him, sings and smiles, and his heart settles easy into the rhythm of her song.

Sir Damien the Pious loves Amaryllis of Exile, and he knows only one way to love: a heedless, headfirst dive, a plummet to the crushing bottom of the lake. Down, and down, and drown.

With so much love as he has, with his overflowing desire to care and please, how lucky is he, then, that there is another who he holds beloved? How lucky is he, then, to be loved in return by both?

Sir Damien the Pious loves Lord Arum, he who rules the Swamp of Titan’s Blooms. And Sir Damien loves, with a protective ferocity, the love that twines between Lord Arum and Amaryllis, as well.

Sir Damien does not think he was built to love monsters. He does think, however, that Lord Arum was built to be loved.

(Rilla agrees with him, in her own playful way. _Oh, of course, he__’s plenty loveable_, she says, rolling her eyes, grinning hard, _when he isn__’t being a brat, I mean_.)

Arum is beautiful like a blade, danger and elegance and potential, and the clever machinations of his mind fascinate Damien in a way that feels helpless, inevitable. He is brilliant, curious, doting, regal, wild, and Damien loves him with an intensity that makes his hands shake. And Arum loves in return- Damien could not have anticipated the way that a monster would love, would never have dreamed that his once-rival would tremble with his own passion, would lose his tongue at Rilla’s beauty, would laugh and grin with jagged teeth when Damien produces a particularly clever turn of phrase, would feign a sneer while drawing them closer regardless, would caress their skin with such delicate care, would look at Damien with naked need and ask with such desperate hope for him to try.

Damien did not need to _try_, to love Arum. He only needed to allow himself to feel what was already in his heart. Damien was always, _always_ meant to love. Down, and down, and down, and the magic of Arum and Rilla loving him in return keeps him breathing, even at the most crushing of depths.

Perhaps, Damien thinks, he was built to be loved as well.

  



End file.
